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And the Grammy goes to… Beyonce’s Big Anti-feminist Mistake

Hey everyone! This is my first post and entrance into the Blog world and I’m so happy that my first post on ShoutOut! is going to be about the one, the only – Beyonce.

So unfortunately I missed the Grammy’s this year. But one’s never-to-fear in this social media era we’re living in, my twitter feed told me about all I needed to know! Most of the earliest tweets/posts were about Beyonce and Jay-Z and the sexiness they exuded as they opened the show with their duet performance of “Drunk in Love.” Being a huge fan of the glamorous and glorious Beyonce myself (seriously, who isn’t though?), I had to do some research and at least watch a horrible-quality youtube video of that performance. Well, after drooling on my keyboard from how absolutely amazing Beyonce is and how great she looked in that crazy-scandalous outfit, one site led to another, led to another, and I ended up on Huffingtonpost.com reading an article on how anti-feminist and offensive their performance was because of some of Jay-Z’s lyrics.

For some background information, Beyonce just released an amazingly pro-feministic album filled with songs of female self-empowerment. Huffington Post called this her “coming-out” as a feminist, but does no one remember Who Run the World from 2011? Possibly one of my favorites. Well, the release of the new album and the feminist essay she published in the Shriver Report took the world by storm and Beyonce became a new stong face of the feminist movement (and really, who better to represent than the Queen B of girl-power herself?).

Now, to unfortunate the nitty-gritty. I never want to talk bad about my girl Beyonce, but it seems as though as soon as she shot out the gate with this role, she shot herself in the foot with her and Jay-Z’s Grammy performance. Beyonce sang along with Jay-Z through one of his most controversial lyric phrases, “I’m Ike Turner, turn up. Baby know I don’t play, now eat the cake, Anna Mae.” This lyric is in direct reference to late Tina Turner’s (formerly known as Anna Mae)’s biography when she describes a disgusting instance in which Ike Turner, who was her husband at the time, force fed her cake by shoving it in her face. The abusive relationship between Tina and Ike, that is further expressed in her biography, and the reason that Tina felt the need to end her own life is not a reference to be taken lately and certainly not one to be in the new feminist idol’s song. It’s been a controversial lyric since the album was released, but they’re not directly Beyonce’s lyrics, so she’s never been too criticized for the line. However in this performance, it was the newly “outted” feminist’s mistake that she sang the line with him. I’m sorry to say that no excuses can really be made for Beyonce on that one.

Let’s face it, we’re not going to be able to stay mad at Beyonce for too long, and I’m sure she’ll make it up to all of us when she riffs her way through her next performance and back into our hearts as the strong femme-Goddess we all thought she was/is. So, what do you all think? Forgive and Forget? Or was this just too much of a step in the wrong direction for someone who gave the feminist culture so much hope?

The lyrics really do disgust me and its hard to think about being sensual with your partner while Jay Z is rapping about a very abusive relationship. The sad part is this isn’t the first time Ike and Tina’s relationship has been made fun or taken lightly in the hip hop industry. I respect Jay Z and Beyonce a lot as artists and people, but they really messed up with this one. Normally I ignore really degrading rap lyrics, but Beyonce with her feminist claims should have really considered what people would think of these lyrics. I will forgive Beyonce, because well it’s Beyonce, but serious damage control should be done to tackle this one! Great post 🙂

Thanks littlelion! And yes, unfortunately it’s easy for us to ignore these types of references because it’s so common for rap lyrics to be insultingly degrading, but this instance is so much more significant because of Beyonce’s feminist stance. Though this reference would be seen as offensive no matter who sang/rapped it, the phrase “practice what you preach” comes to mind…

It’s one of those two steps forward and one step back moments. Like you said her album as a whole is really feministy, but to allow a man (even if it wasn’t her own lyrics) to say something like this on your record doesn’t help women at all, especially if they are in abusive relationships. For me it’s as if she’s saying, “Yes, be a strong and independent woman, but remember than a man is still stronger and has control.” For shame, Lady B, for shame.